Baby Boy is Here! The Birth of Little Warrior, Our 6th Baby

Here we are on delivery day, January 5th, 2012!
Our 6th baby (3rd tubal reversal baby) was born by my 6th c-section weighing in at 5 lbs. 10 oz., 19 inches long. Just a little peanut! Welcome Wyatt James!

I had been having a lot of contractions this pregnancy. My doctor suggested some medication to control the contractions and help my uterus relax a little. She said my uterus was probably "irritated" from having carried so many babies. The medicine definitely slowed the contractions and I tried to stay off my feet. Easier said than done when you're homeschooling three children while chasing a toddler and preschooler!
The last two months of my pregnancy my doctor monitored my uterus closely around my prior incision sites. The uterus appeared to be very thin in places and since I was carrying this baby so LOW it put extra pressure on my scar tissues. There were very real concerns for a uterine rupture. Through lots of prayer and rest along with a medication to slow contractions, I was able to deliver a healthy baby boy on my scheduled c-section date, just 11 days after Christmas!

My birth story wouldn't be complete without mentioning that my doctor was trying to convince me to have yet ANOTHER tubal ligation before delivering! She feared for this baby and for future pregnancies. I verbally consented that after my doctor opened me up and saw a very thin uterus I would consent to the tubal ligation and not have to worry about risking my own health for a future pregnancy. My nurse whom we had gotten to know quite well while we were waiting for my surgery stepped in at the last second and cautioned me to NOT sign anything until my doctor put it into WRITING what we had verbally consented to. My nurse could sense I was unsure about the tubal ligation option and she wanted it in writing. As my doctor came in we discussed the written instructions and I did consent to a tubal ligation if and ONLY IF there appeared to be minimal amount of uterus lining and putting my health and a future pregnancy at risk.
As my doctor began opening me up and before she had even delivered little Wyatt into my arms, she stopped, looked over the curtain, and told me that my insides were beautiful (again, she told me this last time too). She said there appeared to be plenty of uterus with only minimal scarring and whatever was seen on ultrasound was not evident at delivery! (Miracle?) I lay there and settled back into my "happy place" (where I let my mind wander over to the things of God and Heaven and Jesus dying on the cross for my own life as I lay there arms out stretched offering my life for the life of my infant son.) My door of fertility remains open, to whatever God has planned for our family!
"He blessed them, and their numbers greatly increased, and increased their families like flocks." Psalm 107: 38,41

Here he is getting his first finger prints by his Daddy. My husband finger prints people as part of his job as a police officer and he said that this was his smallest finger print detail yet!

Here are a few of his biggest fans!

Our oldest son holding our youngest son! (He was born breech and started this whole process of being born by c-section!)

Our second oldest son (He was born by emergency c-section after going into distress from a failed version-he was breech too!)

Our third son. (He was born head down, but we opted for a c-section with tubal ligation with his birth).

Our first daughter AFTER our tubal reversal! She is in awe of her new baby brother! (I went to a high risk doctor but noone was willing to let me risk a v-back delivery, so I had c-section number 4!)

Our youngest daughter, second tubal reversal baby, holding Wyatt. She loves him "sooo much"! (also born by c-section)

Here is little Wyatt so happy to be home! He clasped his fingers together and thanked the Lord he could be home with his family! But that was short lived...his bilirubin levels skyrocketed...

And back to the hospital we went! It was very emotional for me after working so hard to come home from the hospital to have to go back in. This time we went to a smaller hospital and one of my friends was working on shift that day. She stayed late to get our room set up and settle us in for the evening. She really put me at ease and took such great care of Wyatt and me!

We are so in love with this new little life!

We all couldn't be happier that Wyatt is finally  here!

Love Lives Here

Photo credit

        It's Tuesday, and that means "trash day". As I hear the rumblings of the "Trash Man" making his way down our dirt road it reminds me of how Jesus came to take away our trash.

                "casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you",
                                              1 Peter 5:7

                  So I throw open the front door and sweep the dirt from my home,

Photo Credit

                        I cast my cares on Jesus. He really does care for me.
              The door wide open, sunshine on my face, this is the day
              that the Lord has made! Let's rejoice!

                                                           Photo Credit

                  As I sweep away the dirt, I smell something NASTY!

                  It is my older sons' shoes! Outside they go! Phew!

                   I turn to go back inside now that I have outed the culprit of the nasty stench,
                                  and I notice the smudge marks.

       These are leftover from a day of painting on the front porch with my girls.

                 My daughter's beautiful impromptu art class.

                           This is my world, Welcome!

                                 Enter at your own risk!

             Our floors are a reflection of our lives, marked and scarred...

                Our ceilings are covered in smudges left from boys growing too tall too fast...

                            There is hidden talent everywhere...

                           And marks that never seem to end...

                          But LOVE lives here.

             "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son,
           that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."
                                          John 3:16

                      Be nearer to us this day Jesus, and He said, I AM :)

The Wind Beneath My Wings

I used to run in track in high school.



Jumping hurdles was one of my favorite events.

I also used to be a cheerleader. Both of those activities came to a halt when I was 15. I finally went in to see the doctor for my knee. My left knee was swollen and "locking" on me. It was difficult to walk . Fuzzy x-rays lead my doctor to believe I may have a tumor, but he couldn't say for sure it wasn't cancerous.

Off I went to Mass General for a biopsy. It turned out I did NOT have a tumor PTL, but was diagnosed with Osteo Chondritis Dissecans. Part of my left upper leg bone had been injured some time during my childhood and had lost its blood supply at the knee. A piece of bone was floating around and caused those fuzzy x-rays. The doctors drilled the bone and had me on crutches, non-weight-bearing, for four months. I also had to wear a full-leg, plastic, bendable leg brace for the duration. It fit over a thin pair of pants and slipped into my shoe to stabilize my knee, hoping new bone would regrow.
It didn't really work. After four months of not seeing much regrowth the doctor let me walk on  the leg. Just two years later I was still having knee trouble so I went back in for more surgery. I was 17 and a senior in high school. I ended up spending 6 months of my senior year on crutches. People were probably pretty tired of seeing me on crutches. I never seemed to get off them! I finally did as my doctor wasn't seeing anymore healing and I had already been kind of walking on the leg anyway, trying it out. I wanted to run, I wanted to live!

Six years later, I went in for more knee surgery since the knee was still bothering me. By this time I had gotten married and had two little boys. The youngest was just 5 months old. My sister's wedding was just a week away. My doctor let me use crutches for a week and then gave the go ahead to walk down the aisle for my sister's wedding. The knee was still swollen but I made it down the aisle!




That was 14 years ago. I've never been a runner because of this knee. It probably kept me out of trouble I suppose too. I was interested in joining the military in high school for its GI bill, but my knee held me back. But I still find ways to be active. I love to ride bikes, go hiking, swimming, take walks. I used to take a step class and Pilates class too. My knee is usally there to tell me to slow down.

We have been working out every day for the last month using a DVD called PrayFit. I wanted to add more cardio. Last week I decided to run again. My husband often runs a mile and a half to stay fit for his job as a police officer. He asked our oldest son if he wanted to go running with him. He said, "no". I turned to my husband and said, "I'll go with you!" So began my journey of learning to run!
The first mile and a half was painful and pretty much "sucked". It felt like I was going to die in about three different places along the route! A sharp cramp in my side didn't help much either. But after a day of rest, I actually WANTED to run again!
The first week I ran three times, each 1 1/2 miles. That makes for a total of 4 1/2 miles for Week 1.

Week two of learning to run I found two new running partners since my husband has been sick most of the week. My dog and my nine year-old son like to run with me. Two days at 1 1/2 miles makes 3 miles plus TODAY I decided to extend my run and ummm DOUBLE it and run 3 miles! Yep, I ran 3 miles today! So I still have to stop and walk in a couple of places but I almost entirely ran the 3 miles. So that makes 6 miles run this week, Week 2!
Did I mention that I broke my toe yesterday? Yeah, I stubbed it on one of the baby's infant seats and it hurts like heck! It turned purple and probably is broken. But I can still fit it into my shoe and it stops hurting after the first half mile of the run. No kidding!

So as I pushed through the running this morning, my knee didn't bother me at all, nor the toe. I looked up to the heavens and saw a beautiful blue sky and thought of my dear Grammie who went to be with Jesus just two days ago. She used to walk these same roads. Today I run for her.
Love you Grammie. You are the wind beneath my wings.

Eating Healthier and Trying My Hand At Egg Rolls

So YES, the baby has arrived and he's been keeping us all very busy! I have yet to put my blog post together on his amazing birth but I did want to catch up on the fun I've had on learning to eat healthier and my first attempt at making egg rolls! They're so simple, I can't believe I waited so long to try them!

These are the ingredients I started with! One onion chopped, purple and green cabbage, (shredded -about 2 cups worth), carrots, (shredded-about 1/4 cup), some spinach leaves, (cooked with one pound of our amazing moose sausage!)

Here is what the inside of the egg rolls look like all cooked in a frying pan. No oil used here, only water. The moose sausage is so lean, barely any fat! I also added about a cup of the quinoa/rice/peas dish I was preparing to go alongside the egg rolls.

Here are the egg rolls out of the oven. I brushed them lightly with oil before baking them at 400 degrees for about 15 minutes. You can find these great Asian style wraps in the tofu section of your local grocery store. Their website has some great recipes too!

Dinner is served! I served these amazing egg rolls alongside cooked sugar snap peas, a little apple sauce, and tasty cooked quinoa and rice with chicken and peas. A much healthier alternative to ordering Chinese take-out! Only one of my kids didn't like the egg rolls. Too bad for him, oh well, more for the rest of us! I can't wait to make these again! I wonder what lovely foods I might try inside next time? Sure beats frozen egg rolls, and way cheaper too! If only I could explain to my husband they are STILL "egg rolls" even though there are no eggs INSIDE!!!

Have You Seen the movie "180"?

Have you seen the movie "180"?

I watched the trailer this morning (see below) and it prompted me to want to watch the full 33 minute movie. What on earth can change all these people's minds about abortion?

If you watched the trailer and are as curious as I was you can see the full movie here:

"180" What Changed Their Minds? If the link doesn't work you can find it at http://www.180movie.com/

I believe I have always been pro-life but everyone seems to want to make the case about women's choice. This is an excellent video to watch people right off the streets with real strong opinions about pro-choice completely change their views.

 I have taken it one step further after reading Be Fruitful And Multiply. Nancy Campbell's book was like a 180 movie for me. She helps the reader to realize that not only are babies being aborted by the MILLIONS every year, but even more than that is the tragedy that many good couples calling themselves Christian would choose to use drugs and even permanent surgery techniques in order to thwart God's design for conceiving children.  I sadly, have done BOTH. I will never know if my use of the PILL unintentionally aborted a baby or babies. I have since asked God for forgiveness and He has healed my brokenness and not only restored my health but I am making preparations for our THIRD tubal reversal baby! God is so good. Raising children IS hard work. It takes time, sacrifice, commitment, money, etc. but none of these are good enough reasons to NOT allow God to form new life. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the Life." God is all about LIFE because He IS LIFE! Our pastor and his wife have a wonderful way of retelling scripture, "When we are about God's business, He will be about our business." When we open our eyes to the harsh realities of the Holocaust and abortion, how can we not see that we too play into this picture of DEATH and destruction when we PREVENT life? How many Christians are missing today because good Christian families decided that the standard two children was "enough" I wonder?

I don't know if this is my last baby. I have given my fertility back over to the Lord where it belonged in the first place. He is the giver and sustainer of life alone. We all have a choice to make. What will your "180" be?

Getting It All Organized!

So what exactly should a house look like when you're homeschooling five children? Anyone? ANYONE?
I'm sure everyone's methods of organizing are different. We do what works for us and I am certainly not a very organized person! But I'm learning!

I like to have all the year's books at my fingertips, which can be difficult with a toddler who likes to keep her fingertips busy with all the books!

Here is my overly enthusiastic toddler! I call her the "reorganizer"!


One of the things I started this year was "book baskets". I got this idea from My Father's World. I picked up some inexpensive baskets at my local thrift store and use them for my boys to place many of their reading books for the year. When my son is done with a book, I can just say, go check your book basket and he can find another book. Here is our high school book basket.

A second book basket holds all our audio/visual student aids such as The Teaching Company Cd's/dvd's, Diana Waring's History cd's as well as our Apologia curriculum cd's.

A third book basket holds all our daily devotional books and my third graders reading books and work books. He knows right where to go to get his school workbooks and where to put his school workbooks back when he is done.

And because this is our life right now with high schoolers and toddlers and a new baby on the way, we've converted our changing table to a multipurpose space. A changing table with library underneath! This holds all of my 3rd and 8th graders' books for the year.

Ane here is what it all looks like put together!

A somewhat organized space. It works for us, and my husband even said it looks somewhat organized!

Our Curriculum This Year!

School starts tomorrow for us so I thought I would put on my blog what we are diving into this year! It should be lots of fun. I've spent HOURS pouring over curriculum and ended up going with a variety of sources to fit our needs. I was originally looking at purchasing the BJU Press DVD courses for all of my kids but read a lot of blogs that said while the material is top notch, most parents felt their kids didn't enjoy watching ALL the dvd's. I couldn't see RENTING DVD's that my kids may or may not watch. So we opted to go with several curriculum packages that offer DVD instructors that I will OWN and can RESELL at a later date when we are done with them! The DVD's do really enhance our homeschooling experience though. I am able to offer top notch "private school teachers" to my kids at affordable rates!



For preschool my little girls, (turning 2 and 4 this fall/winter) will be learning along with their older sibling for 3rd grade history and Sonlight science. They will also have their very own curriculum using a variety of soucres including Hooked On Phonics, Phonics Pathways, and Weaver Interlock Program. I also bought the Veritas Press Phonics Museum. This is just an absolutely beautiful program. We will probably take a few years to go through this program but I really like the way integrates great works of art into the alphabet and phonics program. Math will be learning through play and hands on activities. Lots of fun and make believe time too with blocks, playdough, puzzles, dress-up, sand/water table, etc.! Learning through play will be the focus but there will be workbooks too as they show interest.


We are going to be studying U.S. History and biology using Sonlight Core D with my 3rd grader. My preschoolers may join in on many of the fun activities and read alouds too!

My middle schooler will be studying World History/U.S. History with My Father's World and this will be the core for our entire family essentially. I plan to integrate the two U.S. history cores together at different points so the whole family can learn together. There are a lot of fun activities with this course, including cooking and hands on activities using Story of the World Activity Pages. This also includes an art program using God and The History of Art that I will be doing with most of the kids. The music and Bible activities we will use with the whole family. This course suggests a one year study of "Then Sings My Soul" by Robert J. Morgan a look at 150 of the World's Greatest Hymn Stories. I'm really excited about that so my kids can learn about the rich heritage of hymns and how they came to be. My high schooler will learn to play the songs so we can all learn to sing along! For science he will be studying Apologia Physical Science. Math we are finally switching from Switched on Schoolhouse to Teaching Textbooks Pre-Algebra. My son is very excited about his new math program. We were hoping that SOS was going to be similar to Teaching Textbooks but found it to be so much more frustrating and time consuming than FUN.

My high schooler will be finishing up his credits for World History and Geography using a variety of sources,

 Diana Waring's History Revealed,

Mystery of History , BJU World History, Around the World in 180 Days (geography course), with a variety of living books as well as Teaching Company has a wonderful DVD World History course to go alongside his textbook studies. For math he will continue with our much loved Teaching Textbooks Geometry. For science we can't wait to start Apologia Chemistry! We purchase the instructor DVD to go along with this course and find that it greatly enhances the whole learning experience. Red Wagon tutorials carries a wonderful DVD companion to the Apologia course. There will also be outside reading and notebooking/lapbooking to further enhance the course. There are a couple of sources that carry lapbooks/notebooking for Apologia. We have only used Knowledge Box Central so far and really liked the product but I am also looking at another site, similarly priced here, Live and Learn Press.

Language Arts as well as some Bible will be a literature study of World History and the History of God's Kingdom (using Sonlight's Bile core program) literature studying The Cat Of Bubastes,The Epic of Gilgamesh, Homer's The Iliad and the Odyssey, Julius Ceasar, The Tale of Two Cities, Pride and Prejudice, and other great works including The Pilgrim's Progress, The Hiding Place, Animal Farm, Heart of Darkness, The Abolition of Man, Here I Stand, The Imitation of Christ, Mere Christianity,Eric Lidell Pure Gold, What if Jesus Had Never Been Born?, From Jerusalem to Irian Jaya, John Calvin, and many others. On his own, my high schooler continues to study Modern U.S. History and botany and whatever else interests him.

There will also be an in depth study of The Iliad by Homer using the Teaching Company cd course as well as an in depth study on the differences between polytheism and monotheism based around the book, The Secret of The Scribe. More work in Wordly Wise vocabulary books and 10th grade compostion with Writing Strands and Writer's INC.

He also is working through Rosetta Stone for Spanish and Learn and Play the piano DVD's.

I also have a physical education curriculum to follow so my high schooler can get a 1/2 credit for.

Phew! I know there's more we will do, this is just what I have plotted so far. I hope we can get it all done!